News of Idol's renewal broke on Wednesday's performance show when host Ryan Seacrest announced audition dates for Season 14 beginning in Minneapolis on June 18. Seacrest revealed that auditions will swing through the hometowns of all three judges — and specifically singled out New Orleans (Connick) on June 25, New York (Lopez) on July 23 and Nashville (Urban) on July 30. Season 14 is expected to premiere in January 2015.

While the judging panel has received praise from critics and fans, Idol's ratings reached new lows this season, dipping below a 2.0 in the adults 18-49 demo for the first time in the show's history. But the aging competition series still appears to be a priority for the network, with 21st Century Fox senior executive vice president and Idol executive producer David Hill telling TV Guide Magazine in March, "It's never, ever going to achieve the amazingly huge numbers of five or six years ago, but it's going to be a staple on the Fox network for a long, long time."